


#hartwin

by sushicorps (Inclinant)



Category: Kingsman: The Secret Service (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Royalty, Crack, Fix-It, Fluff, Internet, Internet AU, M/M, Meta, Modern Royalty, Post-Canon, Post-Canon Fix-It, Reality, Romance, movies - Freeform, royal au, sort of, very meta
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-01
Updated: 2016-02-01
Packaged: 2018-05-16 10:20:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5824789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Inclinant/pseuds/sushicorps
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Be the Chief of Staff, they said.</p><p>No one ever mentioned having to deal with a pair of oblivious lovestruck idiots going everywhere making heart eyes at each other that ends up charming the entire country who’s now overly invested in their romantic dumbness.</p><p>And all the pining in the castle is enough to drive any sane man mad.</p><p>In other words, Merlin is not paid enough for this.</p>
            </blockquote>





	#hartwin

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ilokheimsins](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ilokheimsins/gifts).



> Dear ilokheimsins, I really hope that you like this.
> 
> Some background context: Takes place in an altered post-canon with a different villain and ending with Harry becoming the King at the end and the Kingsman organisation being changed to more of a Royal Secret Service. Really, just go along with the ride and take nothing very seriously.
> 
> Meta references in fic.

 The hand brush that occurs when Personal Aide Eggsy Unwin goes on stage to pass a fresh bottle of mineral water to His Royal _(frustration and probably the reason for the untimely demise of Merlin’s hair)_ Majesty, King Harry Hart, goes on for just a second too long and of course, the cameraman zooms in to focus on it because he like everyone else in this damn country knows exactly what’s up with the two oblivious blithering fools.

Merlin puts down his favourite mug to save it before an unfortunate accident can happen to it.

The same, however, can’t quite be said for his feelings towards his employer and employee right now.

  
Actually, no, no that’s not quite right. What he really wants to do is just to grab Hart who’s beaming down at his PA all warm fond eyes and Unwin who has the bloody decency to shoot the king a handsome toothsome grin on. _national. fucking. television!_ and just push their faces together and go “Now Kiss” like in all those blasted memes he’s been forced to go through.

  
It would solve like, pretty much every single one of the PR nightmares that plague him daily.

Be the Chief of Staff, they said. Serve your country in a safe, secure, _relatively straightforward_ job, they said.

No one mentioned ever having to deal with a pair of oblivious lovestruck idiots going everywhere making heart eyes at each other that ends up charming the entire country who’s now overly invested in their romantic dumbness.  
  
And all the pining in the castle is enough to drive any sane man mad.

Just last week he had watched Harry choke on his tea and splutter for a good ten minutes, in the middle of a very official diplomatic meeting, just because Eggsy, charming put-together lad that he is, had somehow up-ended the better part of his champagne glass down his very sheer shirt.

It would have all been very amusing, of course, if not for the minor commotion that it had resulted in as everyone jumped in at the same time to aid him, resulting in multiple bruised foreheads and a chuckling diplomat that was probably rethinking the state of their bilateral relations behind those suspiciously twinkly eyes.

“Someone needs to tell them the entire fucking country wants them to kiss each other senseless in front of national television,” Merlin grumbles under his breath, folding his arms and scowling at the small screen streaming the live feed from the cameras covering the National Debate. It’s more of a courtesy thing that Harry has to attend these things, because he’s really just a monarch only in name, but working for the royal family is just as taxing as it is to work in the Prime Minister’s Cabinet. Actually, the very happily married Prime Minister is probably easier to deal with than this atrocity of a royally blind love affair.

“Tell me about it - I took half an hour getting Eggsy out of the broom closet he jumped into and got locked in all to avoid King Harry coming down the corridor,” Roxy mutters, swinging her legs up to cross them on the table she’s perched on, effectively taking up all the space on it and nearly sending his favourite mug nosediving to the floor.

“Well, the fact that His Majesty had apparently just come from the gym showers probably had something to do with that,” She shrugs, completely ignoring the glare that Merlin is sending her way.

Merlin eyes the young woman critically, then decides to let the small faux pas of decorum go, because Roxy has three black belts in karate, jiu-jitsu and taekwondo, but really mainly because she is Roxy Morton.

  
He likes his neck intact, thank you very much.

  
What is his life even.

  
And to think he used to be the Chief of Kingsman. He’ll take sifting through a hundred intelligence reports over this anyday, thank you very much.|

  
He sighs and returns his attention to the screen. It’s completely not helping that Unwin, although standing out of view of the cameras, is practically bouncing on the balls of his feet and glowing under the bright studio lights, beaming like a little shit in Harry’s direction and of course, the King glances off screen in his direction every now and then to give him back a soft smile.

  
Merlin doesn’t need to pick up his phone to know that the two idiots are probably trending right now on twitter - #hartwin #hartwin4ever #hartwinislove

Not to mention all the clickbait headlines that are going to flood the internet and social media tomorrow. Heck, there’ll probably be a gazillion gifs of Eggsy looking at Harry with zero chill and Harry smiling back in utter adoration completed with edited sparkly visual effects. And probably another Buzzfeed article going on about why the two are the perfect real life bromance (or is it romance?).

In his days, ships were proper vessels that sailed the high seas.

Merlin’s going to clean out the stash of whiskey Harry keeps in his study when he gets back to the castle - it’s kept in a safe, but Harry’s passwords to everything if he has a choice is ‘Oxford not Brogues’. Merlin loves his King, honestly, but sometimes he thinks the other is quite daft.

Certainly daft enough when it comes to Eggsy, anyway. Not that the other is much better.

For the highly skilled Kingsman agents that they both were, trained in multiple areas of espionage from neurolinguistic programming to advanced psychology and people reading...

They are complete and utterly _shit_ at flirting when it comes to each other.

“We need to do something about this; seriously, if I could, I’ll just marry the two of ‘em straight up before they can protest-” He finds himself saying out loud and then too late, he realises that Roxy is looking at him with that look in her eye, the look that he recognises as the Morton look of ‘genius’ epiphany. It’s a look that usually leads to either chaos high high and beyond (from James) to just plain regret as something in the distance explodes (from Percival)...and evidently, Roxy has inherited both sides of her father’s traits in spades.

“You _know…”_

 

* * *

  
It is only natural that Harry had been invited to the movie premiere.

Kingsman, after all, was the biopic of King Harry himself, following him from a young prince sneaking into Kingsman, then rising through the ranks to become an established agent, complete with saving the day at the very end and finally ascending to the throne following the repurposing of organisation.

(Somewhere along the way he had also picked up a young rebellious punk from a police station, but that was only a small part of the story - _or is it?)_

This was, of course, before Kingsman had been compromised and was still a _n independent international intelligence agency operating at the highest level of discretion_ \- albeit having a strange penchant for stamping its symbol on every single thing it produced, for discretion purposes, somehow. The movie was extensively based off Kingsman’s decommissioned records archives, but also heavily drawn from the spy genre and so featured wild, grandiose missions carried out in true gentlemanly fashion, complete with suit and umbrella and cheesy gadgets to match.

  
In other words, the script presented to them had been completely ridiculous, but Harry had found the idea so amusing despite Merlin’s protests that he had given the go ahead anyway. It had pissed the conservative nobles (read: Chester King, who no one liked anyway) right off, but as Harry had pointed out in the grand row between him and his (‘long-suffering’ - Merlin would interjected) Chief of Staff, they were all just snobbish pish-posh aristocrats with weak chins who still can’t get over how their titles were all just in-name only and probably could be bought for a pretty penny in the black market.

Personally, Eggsy didn’t mind. At all. Certainly not when they’d cast Colin Firth as Harry and the first time he had went past the filming in the castle, he may have walked into a suit of armour. Or two.

  
And then wistfully wondered how nice it would be if a three piece suit was Harry’s official kingly attire while two Production Assistants had to untangle him from the armour.

  
The camera flashes are blinding and the atmosphere is _incredible._ Harry’s already disappeared down the red carpet, engulfed by the cast that’s quite beyond themselves that the subject of their much anticipated film has come down to attend the premiere. There’s a whole host of Kingsman agents in the crowd too, so Eggsy’s not too worried about Harry’s safety, but still, his job is to be always by the other’s side so he dives headfirst into the mess on the red carpet. It’s just a bit tough, squeezing through the ton of celebrities and wildly clamouring crowd - _holy shit, there’s Colin Firth!_

Okay, so maybe Eggsy is that odd ball who had grown up on Pride and Prejudice and Fast and Furious, but when you’ve got Colin freaking Firth as Mr Darcy, who wouldn’t want a piece of that, _amirite._

  
Eggsy totally has never pictured himself as Elizabeth. For starters, he would never look half as fine in a dress.

He totally has to get an autograph from Colin Firth…  
…  
For his mum.  
_Yeah._

[(The ‘Keep Calm and Love Colin Firth’ mug at home is also definitely not his.)](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B5pL6PhIUAAyTan.jpg:large)

He starts off enthusiastically in Colin’s direction, but then there is someone snagging his sleeve and he turns only to find a camera aggressively shoving itself in his face. Then a mike joins it and he squints amidst the flashing lights to make out the svelte figure of the most unimpressed reporter he has ever seen.

“Name’s Gazelle, from Valentine News - so, what’s your opinion on the popular…”shipping” between you and King Hart?” She reads off the card, completely deadpan and then turns a steely gaze onto him that has him taking a step back because there’s a thinly veiled look in her eyes that hints that she can strike terror into mere mortal men with her perfectly straight hair and sharp, slim legs.

“I’m...I’m sorry, shipping? What’s shipping?” He babbles, embarrassingly.

“ _Really?_ I don’t have time for this, asking me to do interviews and play _bingo_ ,” Gazelle mutters under her breath, boredly shuffling through her cards.

Shit, is that something he’s supposed to know? Eggsy gulps, stuffing his hands into his pockets, suddenly unsure of himself as he desperately wracks his mind. What is shipping? Fed-Ex shipping? International mail? Air shipping? Ships? Boats? Yachts? _Cruise ships???_

  
On her part, Gazelle just raises one perfectly shaped brow and waving a hand in disdainful dismissal. “It’s nothing, really.”

“Oh god, thank god, your expression made me panic then! I thought I’d said something really rude! Is that like, a bad thing? A bad word? [Shipping?](http://secondarysushicorps.tumblr.com/post/137674014602/gentlemensarmor-tarons-brief-crisis-about-the)” 

Gazelle just stares back at him, then shakes her head slowly and turns around with a snap of her fingers, immediately drifting away into the crowd, leaving a thoroughly baffled Eggsy behind.

Right so…Eggsy moves to continue down the carpet, but the stop has lead to a barrage of reporters bearing down on him in full paparazzi force.

“Gary Unwin! A comment about your own training for Kingsman, please!”

“Uh, no comment, no-”

“What’s so special about Fitting Room Two?”

“ _Nothing!_ I swear the whole cherry thing is a joke-”

“Are we ever going to find out what happened in the breakfast incident you talked about in your interview last month?”

_“No!’_

He’s too busy trying to escape the reporters that he doesn’t realise until he backs right into the person he had been searching for in the first place.

“Ah, Eggsy, pleasure to meet you again.”

It takes Eggsy all of one second to register the voice and then he whirls around only to see Colin Firth standing in front of him, one hand offered in greeting. Eggsy only just remembers to take it and shake it like normal people do.

Chill, Eggsy, _chill._

“I...uh, it’s uh, yeah! Great to see you again! Really excited for the show too! I’m sure the movie’s aces.”

Super chill, he's got this.

“Thank you very much,” Colin replies with all his gorgeous Firth charm, top few buttons of his shirt unbuttoned as always, and Eggsy squashes a dreamy sigh because it would not do to swoon on the red carpet.

“Abandoning your job now to chase after movie stars, I see.”

A firm hand snakes around his side and pulls him close to Harry’s side as the other steps free from the crowd and gives Colin a curt nod. Eggsy sucks in a breath, heart tripping a bit from suddenly being pressed right up against Harry’s tall frame like this, in-between two unfairly handsome gentlemen.

And... right on cue, another reporter barges in.

“Your Majesty! Your Majesty! Maybe a pose for the cameras!”

“Of course,” Harry says graciously and Eggsy quickly scoots out from his side to get out of the picture. Colin just nods them both a polite goodbye, before turning to where his young co-star is pulling him aside.

“Uh with your aide, if you will?” The cameraman motions, waving Eggsy over enthusiastically. “Aw c’mon, a little closer now, loosen up, strike a pose!”

“On a scale on one to ten, how close?” Eggsy jokes and the reporter laughs.

“Eleven?”

* * *

 

 

* * *

  
“I hafta be ta’ world’s biggest fuckin’ _idiot_ , Rox,” Eggsy whines, completely losing the neutral Royal standard accent that he tries to keep for work (and any sense of pronunciation at all, actually) and flops over the bar table. Roxy winces and pushes his third beer glass away from him, smiling sympathetically at the horrified waiter who had only just put that glass down.

“Yeah, he’s shit at holding his liquor when he’s upset,” She feels obliged to explain, then sighs at her completely inebriated friend.

The thing was, as a Morton, being not only the daughter of the neighbouring royal family and two established ex-knights, the rest of the candidates had been downright suspicious of her in the Kingsman training - all except for Eggsy, that was, who had came right over and stuck out his hand with this broad dumb grin on his face.

Later, she’ll learn that he really just hadn’t known any better, bless his pug-loving heart, but they had immediately gotten along, right as rain, the two oddballs against the rest of the Eton-Oxbridge educated males. As it was, they were the only two to finish the training at all. And then someone had tried to blow up the Earth, Chester King turned on them and they just barely managed to save the world at the cost of blowing their organisation cover completely.

 “I just dunno what came o’er me, Rox! I just, I dunno, wasn’t thinkin’ at all!" Eggsy throws his arms out and for the second time tonight, Roxy’s glad that she hadn’t cancelled the booking of the entire bar tonight even after Harry had decided to return to the castle instead.

“Yes indeed, I can’t think of what must’ve come over you,” Roxy mutters into her beer. “A little thing called being in love maybe. Been pretty obvious ever since you stayed every other night by Harry’s side whilst he was in a coma mooning over him, really.”

“Harry’s gonna kill me, I just know it. Oh god, it’s probably all over the news too, yeah? Will I get like beheaded for this- Oh fucking hell, me mum’s gon see this. And me mates! What if lil’ Daise sees it!... _Fuck_ I should just ask Harry to behead me after all.”

“I really don’t think your six-year old sister will think anything of your behaviour tonight, Eggsy. Also, I think beheading has been illegal since the nineteenth century.”

She takes a long sip. “Besides, it’s not like everyone doesn’t already know you’ve got a torch for Harry brighter than the hideous gold plaque jacket you have.”

“Wot are you talkin’ ‘bout, I don’t haf...hafa...have a thing for ‘arry! I don’t! He’s my b-boss! _And the King!_ He can have anyone he wants and...and I’m just a bloody...pleb he fished out that day from ta’ police station, but Rox, he looked so damn fine that day standin’ there in _unf,_ that goddamn suit with his long legs crossed on the steps an’ all, you should’ve _seeeen_ it Rox.”

Roxy takes another long, _long_ drink.

“But _y’know,_ Harry’s always smilin’ at me sometimes? And whenever he says I make ‘im proud I just feel all happy inside... I just really like him smiling at me, why do I really like him smilin’ at me Rox?” Eggsy turns to her, pouting a little and looking remarkably like JB at the moment.

“But it’s so nice and I feel all happy inside, like I’m high or somethin’ but it’s a feeling better than drugs, ya know, I mean I got clean after Harry got me into King...Kingsman, you know what, why are we called Kingsman but not Kingsmen anyway? I mean, we’re an organ..organis...we’re a team, right? That is, plural innit? So why man and not, well, men? And why only men! There’s you too! Ain’t that sexist or somthin-”

Lord save me, Roxy mutters to herself, then quickly fishes out her phone to silence that horrible bagpipe tune that Merlin had hacked into it (and made sure she couldn’t change it, arse.)

“So what’s the damage?”

“Eggsy’s interview with ValPost has already over 20,000 hits on youtube and it’s already been written in 5 articles, one of which is entitled : Reasons why Eggsy Unwin is the most adorable innocent puppy everyone should love - incidentally, I disagree with every single reason listed.”

“That’s not too ba-”

“The picture of Eggsy clinging onto Harry’s side is now trending nationally on multiple social network sites and if I see one more variant of HART EYES FOR YOU like this blasted Buzzfeed article title, I will shoot the next journalist I see.”

Roxy winces. “Please don’t.”

“Get a cup of tea on your way back, will you? ...Actually, no, make that an espresso. A double-shot espresso. No, triple.”

“Got it,” Roxy replies, then quickly turns back to Eggsy as the other suddenly shoots up in his seat-

_“Oh my god I love Harry.”_

-and then promptly went out like a light.

“So…” Roxy turns back to her phone. “Are you sure you still don’t think my plan is a good idea?”

 

* * *

 

The summary of the next week goes like this:

There had been pie, _everyday_ , at every meal, morning tea, afternoon tea and evening supper included _the entire week._ All because a certain King had graced an embassy dinner, found the pie absolutely divine, then ordered all 25 flavours from the pleasantly surprised bakery just to let Eggsy try it because he didn’t know what flavour the other would like.

The next day, Eggsy had to go into Medical for indigestion and it transpired that he didn’t even like pie but had eaten an entire pie upon hearing that Harry had gotten it for him anyway.

Also, the last form of eggs has officially been banned from being served at breakfast as Eggsy finally exhausts the last of egg-related bad innuendos and horrible puns. It’s borderline terrifying how he does so with zero awareness and really, curse Lee Unwin (may he rest in peace) and his absolutely shit nicknaming skills.

(Merlin’s still pissed that he can’t look at a plate of his favourite soft-boiled eggs again without hearing Eggsy’s voice going, completely innocently: “I guess Harry likes his eggs all slick and runny, eh?”.)

In other news, Unwin is, apparently, the internet’s new sweetheart. There is a new ValPost article with an entire gallery of Eggsy, who for some reason, had decided to cuddle one of the royal corgis while dressed in a “casual loose dove grey jumper that falls about his broad shoulders and defined frame in soft folds and homely worn light blue jeans that sits well about his hips and strong thighs” at the polo season’s opening match on the castle grounds.

Most of the photos, however, had been of that one moment that the polo ball had escaped to the side lines only for Eggsy to pick it up, dog still tucked in his arms, to pass it to Harry astride his thoroughbred in his fine riding breeches - of course, the sun just had to be obscured by a cloud at that very moment, draping a soft light over their two figures, caught by a very lucky photographer.

Long story short, Eggsy’s been declared the precious welsh corgi prince who is perfect for their king.

Merlin’s just thankful that the week is coming to a close.

But of course, clearly Friday morning is too early to hope for any peace at last.

“Why are all my alerts on Harry going crazy?” He demands, holding out the offending screen of his tablet out for answers.

  
Roxy whirls around in her chair, typing furiously on her laptop to draw up a window. “Apparently, Eggsy convinced Harry to get Instagram.”

  
“And what did they post?”

  
“Themselves baking muffins at midnight, apparently,” She turns her laptop around to show him the selfie. “It’s been garnering hits everywhere, from here all the way to _Korea."_

"Actually, it’s fascinating how they’re such a huge hit in Korea of all places...”

Merlin is speechless beyond speechlessness.

”It’s currently circulating on tumblr, by the way," Roxy continues. "Trending on the Hartwin tag actually. I think the general consensus is going along the line of “OMGOMGOMGOMGOMG SOMEONE HOLD ME I CANNOT STOP BEING SO CUTE’ and “I died” “

  
“All in one sentence? Shouldn’t a comma go in there somewhere? And why does everyone keep dying?”

Roxy shrugs. “It’s the internet,” She says, and that’s a fair explanation.

“I mean, the account could be useful for royal publicity, give a glimpse into the King’s private life and bring him closer to the younger crowd. Eggsy’s instagram account for JB is actually quite a hit...Merlin, are you okay?”

Merlin drags the nearest swivel chair over and sits down on it heavily, burying his head in his palms.

“You know, I spent eight years in the military and two decades as a Kingsman. And this is what I do now.”

“...And?”

“I’m _done._ Let’s do this.”

 

* * *

 

Harry walks slowly into his study, stifling the groan on his lips as he kneads at the sore spot on his forehead from where he had walked into an overhead bar. And then missed the first step and so went tumbling down the stairs.

He may have amnesia-darted the poor guard who had just happened to be patrolling that corridor.

He’s going to need to tell Merlin to renovate the yoga room away from the glass front of the castle gym, just so he doesn’t have to risk walking by just as Eggsy’s in the middle of a downward dog again.

“Late again, Galahad. And you look like shit, by the way,” Merlin remarks from where he’s already made himself comfortable in a drawn up chair, finishing off the last of the whiskey in the decanter Harry keeps on his desk. Whiskey that’s been disappearing remarkably fast these days, now that he thinks about it.

“So do you, Merlin. How’s my whiskey?” He sits down in his chair, ignoring his protesting and slightly bruised back. “What is so urgent, anyway?”

“You’re in love with Eggsy.”

Harry freezes mid-grab from where he’d been trying to steal the last of the whiskey back before Merlin could finish it all off.

“I have no idea where you get that impression fro-”

“You were baking muffins with the man yesterday at midnight, Harry.”

“It meant nothing-”

“Muffins, Harry _, fucking muffins_."

Merlin slams his tablet down with the selfie of Eggsy and him with muffin batter playfully splattered over the two of them down before him. Harry takes a long, half wistful, look at it and sighs.

“I know what it looks like, but there is nothing between Eggsy and I,” He says slowly, although his heart sinks with every word. It’s not like he hasn’t been here a thousand times before, constantly catching himself mid-smile at the other and wondering.

“We simply share the relationship of a mentor and a mentee, an employer and an employee at the moment, even if we happen to have a close working relationship.”

Merlin doesn’t reply for a long while.

“You’re fooling no one, Harry.”

The taste of whiskey leaves a cruel bitter aftertaste at the back of his throat.

“He is a remarkable young man.” Harry says finally, putting down the glass heavily on the table top. So it is finally the time to put a word to all the feelings that he has contemplated deep into many a night.

“Brave and so talented - _brilliant,_ really - loyal and kind...but above all, _so young._ He still has so many years ahead of him. I can’t...I can’t offer anything that he deserves.” Harry closes his eyes, knowing that the other will pick up the three unspoken words that mean it all in that long string of words. ”He should find someone his age to spend his life with.”

Merlin eyes him for a beat, then collects his tablet back with a cool, calculative look.

“Okay, so, if there’s nothing between you and Eggsy, that’s great! But you have to get married.”

_“What?”_

“It turns out,” Merlin says, completely nonchalantly as if he hasn’t set a fucking bomb down before Harry with the news, ”there’s a law stating that in order to keep the throne, a King must marry before he is 55.”

Harry grabs the tablet back from Merlin and stares at the almost illegible scan of a paper so old all the edges were practically disintegrating. “With all due respect, Merlin, _are you fucking kidding with me right now?”_

His Chief-of-Staff carries on, unfazed. “So you’re now, officially engaged.”

“To _who?!”_  
  
“Roxy has kindly volunteered to take up the role. It’ll be a pretense marriage, of course. Still, it’s not like the two of you will be an unsuitable match. She is, after all, still Morton royalty and it’s not like previous Kings have taken brides even younger-”

“Roxy?! No wait, stop, can’t something be done about this? This is bloody ridiculous, I don’t-”

“Well, you don’t have a choice. “

 

* * *

 

The official announcement of the engagement might’ve broken the internet, Merlin thinks.

Or at least all 23 dedicated Hartwin fansites.

He almost feels slightly guilty. (Almost)

 

* * *

 

It probably reflects terribly on all of Eggsy’s training that he is grabbed off the streets as easily as he is. He wracks his brains in the back of the van, an actual potato sack over his head, for all of his escape training and then his mind, thoroughly addled by the strawberry daiquiris he had been downing all night, gives up.

Instead, he sits numbly on the floor, still trying to come to terms with the fact that Harry is getting married, _married!,_ to Roxy in a few hours and he should probably do something to get out of here but _fucking hell, Harry and Rox, married?_  
  
Sure Roxy had told him it was just a fake marriage, just a thing to make sure no trouble came to Harry about the throne before they found some way to invalidate the ancient clause Merlin had somehow dug out, but it was still…The idea of Harry being married just seems completely bonkers, like how could there be someone else by his side every day listening to his random quotes from eighteenth century authors and quips on suits and being on the receiving end of one of Harry’s small smiles-  
  
He’s still deep in his thoughts when his captors yank the sack off his head.  
  
All things considered, it is only reasonable that he had been expecting himself to be in a torture cave with a menacing, giant meat-hunk cleaver-wielding torturer walking circles around him, hood on head and all, with a gazillion other torture devices laid out on a rack behind him.

Instead, he finds himself staring at a wedding dress.

Okay, that’s new.

New, but still, what the _fuck_.

“What the _fuck_ is going on?!” Eggsy says after two seconds, whipping his head around wildly to take in the rest of the room that he easily recognises as the Kingsman Round Table they'd moved into the castle. Eggsy never really understood the name - the table’s fucking _rectangle_.)

“Read this,” Merlin says and thrusts a piece of paper into Eggsy’s hands.

“I am secretly in love with ~~Car, Charle, Charles~~ , Charlie and have run away to be with my true love forever. I am very sorry. Love, Roxy,” Eggsy reads aloud, then stares at the older man incredulously.

“Roxy hates Charlie. His name is struck out three times.”

  
“Well, yeah, uh, maybe she’s too in love to notice, probably.” Merlin snatches the note back. “The point is, Eggsy, the wedding is in less than an hour, it is being filmed live and if no one shows up it will be a national embarrassment for Harry.”

  
“So you need me to track down Rox, yeah? Got it,” Eggsy musters a grin that even he knows is a weak one and shoots out of the chair, which would be all nice and well except he has completely forgotten that his ankles are still tied to the chair legs so he just ends up falling face down into the carpet.

  
“Ahem,” Merlin clears his throat and gives the wedding dress on the mannequin a strange look. “Actually, my original solution is much simpler and quicker.”

  
“Wot?” Eggsy says through a mouthful of carpet fibres, then follows Merlin’s gaze to the dress with a slowly sinking sense of dread.

  
“Oh no, oh no, oh no no no, _Merlin-_ ”

 

* * *

  
Eggsy is really, really tired of getting tied up today.

  
“Such a coincidence that the dress fits you perfectly,” is all Merlin says before he cuts his wrists free and shoves Eggsy down the aisle into the small chapel that they’d chosen for Harry’s wedding - just a small, private ceremony first for the happy couple to say their vows before the bigger formal one a few months down the road that would serve as the proper press and dignitary reception.

  
The dress really does fit him well, suspiciously so actually, because Eggsy is absolutely positive that there is no way in hell Roxy and him can share the same size. But as it is, the sweeping elaborate lace collar lies perfectly across his broad shoulders and down his chest, tapering in elegantly at his waist before flaring out into a long train of shimmering satin behind him.

  
The chapel is so small that it’s only a few steps between the door to the podium. He can see Harry already waiting there, clad in a tuxedo made of velvet of all things that makes him look all dapper in ways that makes Eggsy’s mouth dry and a flush of heat shoot through him. The camera whirls softly in the background, waiting for him.

  
For Harry, Eggsy thinks, takes a step forward and promptly trips over the hem of the dress.

  
“Roxy, are you oka- Eggsy? What are you doing here?”

  
Eggsy wants to bury himself into the nearest hole. He groans into the carpet and then picks himself up a bit to look back at Harry, who’s a little baffled and confused but there’s also a pleasantly surprised look in his eyes that strikes him as strange but makes him feel all warm inside.

  
“Well…” Eggsy starts as he tries to push himself up, fighting a losing battle with the seemingly endless fabric he is swimming in - how do women wear these bloody things?! - and barely balancing himself with Harry’s hands support him up.

“Seems like Rox’s sweet on Charlie so she up and eloped, that’s wh-”

“You’re sweet on me?” Charlie’s voice pipes up from the back.

  
_“No,_ shut up Charlie,” Roxy’s voice comes hissing back and Eggsy has just about maneuvered himself onto his knees to turn back and gape at the two familiars at the back of the room, hiding behind the cameras.

  
_“Rox?!”_

  
Merlin is breaking down into muffled laughter in the other room. Harry just groans and covers his face with his palm for a long moment, then helps Eggsy to his feet.

  
“My dear Eggsy, I do believe we have been set up,” Harry helps him to his feet, shaking his head a little all the while. “Although you look very dashing in that dress.”

  
“I- I just can’t, I, what the fuck, Rox, Merlin, I can’t believe this!”

  
He’s trying to be indignant, but Harry’s velvet suit is all soft and warm on his side and he really just wants to sort of...melt into it. He’ll blame the drinks, along with the whole being wrestled here tied up and all and the crazily bright camera lights, or maybe it’s just the fault of the sheer ludicrousness of the entire situation, but Eggsy just turns to Harry and grins playfully.

  
“Y’know, for the record, I would’ve said ‘I do’.”

  
“Well, _I do, too_ ,” Harry replies and then leans in to kiss him.

  
It’s the best fucking kiss Eggsy’s had in his life.

 

* * *

 

It’s only later in the honeymoon suite that Roxy has so thoughtfully arranged for (and would be a complete pity to let it go to waste) that they realise the problem with the dress:

  
“Uh, Harry, I can’t get out of the sodding dress.”

  
“...Oh bollocks.”

 

* * *

 

As it is, King Harry Hart gets married, officially, to his ex-Personal Aide Eggsy Unwin a couple of months later on a lovely spring day very much like the day they first met.

  
Merlin releases a wild, fanciful tale of spies and saving the world and falling in love that the media and internet just laps right up, right along the pictures of the two decked out in matching tuxedos and fingers interlocked.   
  
_#hartwin_ of course.

 

* * *

 

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the prompt: AU - Roxy elopes with her paramour the night before she is to wed Harry Hart, king of the neighboring kingdom, and, in a mad attempt to save face, Eggsy gets stuffed into her wedding dress.
> 
> ...Yeah.  
> It somehow ended up like this.  
> I have nothing to say for myself  
> I will also kick myself out of the fandom now.


End file.
